


when soft voices die

by vanr



Series: taz drabbles [2]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Music
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-31
Updated: 2017-12-31
Packaged: 2019-02-25 22:20:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13222404
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vanr/pseuds/vanr
Summary: Lucretia is aware, when she sets out creating the Bureau of Balance, that she is basically recreating the International Planar Research Institute. The people she chooses for her new organization are tested for their mettle, for their strength and agility, for their wisdom and intellect, and only those who pass are employed. But there is one man, and only one man, who she picks for his song.





	when soft voices die

Lucretia is aware, when she sets out creating the Bureau of Balance, that she is basically recreating the International Planar Research Institute. And she’s okay with that, because she knows this is the right thing to do.

Compared to other things she’s had to do, this one sits easy.

The Bureau may have been run like the IPRE, but she knows it’s different. The IPRE poked their nose into things they could not begin to understand. The Bureau is built to destroy those things. The Bureau exists, in a sort of roundabout way, to undo the mistakes that the IPRE had made. 

The Bureau exists to undo her own mistakes. All of their mistakes.

But it is run similarly to the IPRE. And like them, she can only take the best of the best. The truest heroes, the ones pure of heart and strong of body and soul. 

She finds these heroes one at time, by investigating rumors and testing them one by one, at first with literal, written tests. Those end up falling short, as heroes are more inventive when their lives are in danger. So she amps up the test, and finds the results satisfactory. She is okay with the heroes under her employ.

Those like Killian, whose unparalleled dedication to this cause blows Lucretia away. She feels guilty, every time she sees her. She has no idea that her own boss is responsible for the very suffering she fights to end. 

She always feels guilty, though. It doesn’t take much. All she needs to look at the portrait over her desk, to do something  _ they _ once did together, or to even see the color red. She misses  _ them _ so much, and it pains her.  Sometimes all she can do is sit and let the thoughts crash over her like ocean waves. Thoughts that this was all a mistake, that she had doomed this plane and all the others. That she wouldn’t be able to find all the artifacts and their sacrifice would be for nothing.

Worst of all, that they wouldn’t forgive her.

But she powers through. A look at her portrait, at one of the few times they were all together and nothing was wrong and they were happy, reminds her of all she lost. Of everything they all lost. And it never fails to strengthen her resolve. 

Lup is gone. She knows that. Lup left and never came back. But the rest of them… for the rest of them, there was hope. Impossible, fleeting, but still there. Flickering, faintly, like a candle in a strong breeze.

She has to fight to keep them alive. She fights for their happiness. She fights for them like she did on the world with the Judges. She fights because someday, when she succeeds and she can put this all behind her, she will be able to see them again.

Seeing them now, with no memories of their little family, is almost worse than seeing them turned to stone, but she can’t stop and linger on that. 

If she spends too much time lingering over her own mistakes, she’ll be lost in regret and then everything she’s given up, everything she’s taken, will be for _nothing._

\---

The Bureau becomes her second home, second after the Starblaster. And since she can’t go  _ there _ without feeling their ghostly presence, the Bureau quickly becomes her only home.

She leaves it now only when a particularly promising hero is discovered.

She’s down now, on the surface, at a tavern that a local folk hero is known to frequent. She sits at a table all on her own, arms crossed and sending out a vibe that keeps all others from interacting with her in any way. 

No one is brave enough to approach her, and for that she is disappointed. It either means that the hero isn’t there, or isn’t brave enough to face her, and either way it means the mission is a failure. 

She finishes her drink quickly and stands up to leave when she notices a figure standing at her table.

She’s gotten a description of the hero, and although this isn’t him, she waits. Anyone brave enough to face her here deserves her attention, at least for a moment.

The figure in front of her is a young half-elf man, dressed in a gaudy court jester’s outfit and holding a viol, which dangles next to his legs. His eyes are half-lidded, his expression twisted and dour. His face is bent into a permanent-looking frown.

He starts when he notices her staring, but brings his viol up to his chin before she can say anything. He nods, mutters something about her looking lonely (and she doesn’t even want to know how he saw  _ that _ from across the tavern), holds the bow up to his instrument and begins to play.

He plays a song and Lucretia swears she’s heard it before. It sounds familiar, enticing, and  _ absolutely beautiful. _ She’s crying and she’s aware she’s crying, but in her head all she can see is galaxies and stars and her family.

She sees Merle dancing, Davenport performing his song, Taako cavorting around and talking in his witty aphorisms, Barry and Lup falling in love, and Magnus’s tiny little wooden duck. She hears a song, and looks to see, just for a moment, a red haired boy singing a song she had heard so many times before, in a reality that is now long behind her.

The bard’s song is eerily similar to that boy’s song, the song from a soul lost long ago. A soul lost to the hunger, to the darkness.

She can’t even fight the tears in her eyes at the song, at the memories that she retained but the others lost. Memories of them. Her family.

When the bard finishes, he looks surprised to see how strong her reaction was.

“I-I’m sorry, I didn’t mean-” he stammers, knuckles going white where they gripped his viol. He shrinks back from her, eyes darting around frantically. 

She reaches for him, holding her hand over his. His mouth opens slightly, eyes going down to look at her hand on his and then meeting hers. 

“It’s okay,” Lucretia tells him, trying to send him a smile. “I liked it.”

He looks uncertain, even then. “But… ma’am, you’re crying.”

She laughs gently, wiping away her tears. “It reminds me of better times,” she says, contemplatively. “You remind me of someone I knew a very long time ago.”

The bard’s eyes widen, but not in fear. Instead, he seems curious. He pulls back the chair and sits, regarding Lucretia. “Would you like to talk about it?”

Her guard is up in a moment, shooting the young man a harsh glare. “Why?”

He looks nonplussed this time, unaffected. “It looks like you need it,” he says with a shrug.

So she tells him. She keeps it vague, because he can’t know too much without being inoculated, but she tells him of time spent at a music conservatory, of a young boy who worked hard every to perfect his masterpiece and who failed to pass the test, but whose music was still some of the sweetest she had ever heard. She tells him that, and she sees something in his eyes. 

She tells him that the boy died, and the bard’s expression grows wistful. 

“He lives on in the music, then?” he asks, as if this should be the natural progression. Like it’s obvious to him. 

And although his soul is gone, obliterated, taken by the Hunger, she nods. Because maybe the bard is right. Maybe the boy did live on in the music. 

Maybe they all did.

At her affirmation, the bard smiles. He stands and gives Lucretia a bow, sending her a smile when his spine straightens. He turns to go, but Lucretia stops him.

Fisher- no, the fish’s name can’t be Fisher any more. The jelly had always responded positively to music, and she was pretty sure this young man was the most capable musician she could find. So she reaches, grabs at his arm to stop him.

“Ma’am?” he asks, although he doesn’t seem particularly concerned. 

“Would… would you like a job?” she asks.

And two months later, when she goes to visit what Johann named the Voidfish, she sees the difference. The fish’s glow is brighter than ever, the galaxies contained inside it vibrant and alive. 

And Johann, although not exactly happy, seems pleased to finally have an audience who would always, always listen.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> please don't fire me for tagging it "Johan" but spelling it "Johann" i'm a simple lad and i like the way it looks with two n's. thanks to scenitroute for help with the summary!


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